DriveTimes Five

Five strange Land Rover facts

You probably know that Land Rover used the Velar name to disguise the first Range Rover test vehicles, but did you know that it also invented the car-based crossover SUV... then promptly did nothing with it? Today we bring you five facts about Land Rover you might not know.

Late arrival

The first Land Rover was introduced back in 1948 by Rover, but the company called ‘‘Land Rover’’ wasn’t born until the wildly exciting period of British car industry mismanagement in 1975.

Amid the industry’s slow and messy demise, British Leyland went all wobbly and was nationalised, which resulted in Land Rover being spun off as a separate brand in a commercial division called the Land Rover Leyland Group. This didn’t last too long, however, as in 1978 Land Rover Limited was formed as a separate subsidiary of British Leyland.

First crossover

Back in 1951 Rover was considering a larger, more road-oriented model than the Land Rover Series, so Gordon Bashford came up with the ‘‘Road Rover’’ project. Geddit? Land Rover and Road Rover?

The Road Rover featured the upright, boxy styling of an off-roader like the Land Rover, but was based on the RWD Rover P4 saloon platform. That’s right, the ‘‘Auntie Rover’’ was the basis for a pioneering crossoverSUV, a type of vehicle reviled by offroad zealots the world over. Despite coming up with the idea for a carbased SUV-style vehicle, Rover promptly dropped the project.

Weird wheels

Back in the 1950s the British Forestry Commission needed a vehicle that could tackle seriously deep mud puddles. ‘‘Oh, that’s cool,’’ said Rover. ‘‘We have this thing called the Land Rover which can do that.’’

‘‘Not good enough,’’ said the commission, ‘‘We need something extremely silly’’. So Rover bolted some tractor tyres on a heavily modified Land Rover Series IIA and offered that. Around the same time a Scotsman called James Cuthbertson bolted some tank tracks to his Series II and Rover said ‘‘Oh, that’s cool. We’ll offer that as an option too.’’ So it did.

Anti-luxury

Despite essentially inventing the idea of a more civilised off-road vehicle than the Land Rover, Charles Spencer King did not like what eventually evolved from that concept – the Range Rover’s move to luxury status.

In 2004, he was critical of owners who drive their vehicles in urban areas, saying that vehicles like the Range Rover he created were ‘‘never intended as a status symbol but later incarnations of my design seem to be intended for that purpose’’. He was also dismayed that his creation had become ‘‘an acceptable alternative to Mercedes or BMW for the pompous, self-important driver’’.

Bad movie

If you are a fan of 2000AD comics and, in particular the character Judge Dredd, you will almost certainly hate the movie that Land Rover specially built 31 vehicles for in 1995.

The Sylvester Stallone adaptation of the beloved comic character in the movie Judge Dredd was truly awful, but the Land Rover ‘‘City CAB’’ models built for it were spectacular.

Based on the 101 Forward Control, the taxis were heavily armoured battle trucks for transporting the population in a dystopian 2139, where Land Rover is the only remaining vehicle manufacturer and Sylvester Stallone is the law. Don’t laugh; it could happen.